Nabil K. Mark / Centre Daily Times
Former Penn State football assistant coaches Booker T. Brooks, left, and Dick Anderson, right, leave the Centre County Courthouse, in Bellefonte. The defense began presenting its case in Jerry Sandusky's trial Monday.

BELLEFONTE - In an awkward attempt to dull the significance of Jerry Sandusky's acknowledged habit of showering with young boys, two of his former Penn State colleagues told jurors Monday they too have washed up with children by their side.

The former offensive line coach Dick Anderson said he showered in the same room as youths "all the time" at the YMCA and "on occasion" at the Penn State football facility when Sandusky would bring in young boys from his Second Mile charity.

"If Jerry would bring someone in with The Second Mile, they had been working out for whatever reason, they would come in and shower," Anderson said. "It was not uncommon on occasion, and other coaches would come in and out as well."

Anderson, who sat with Sandusky's family in the gallery on the first day of the trial, said he never saw the former defense coordinator engage in sexual behavior with the youths he brought into the football facility.

The unwanted bear hugs, grabbing of genitals and attempts at anal sex happened when no one else was around, prosecutors said.

Booker T. Brooks, who moved back to the State College area three years ago after attending Penn State and coaching there from 1968 to 1983, said he frequently showered alongside youths as a football coach and while a counselor at a YMCA summer camp in his native Akron, Ohio.

"Even currently right now, as I am a grandfather, I take my young grandchild to the YMCA and since she's not old enough to go into a room by herself, I take her in and shower with her," Brooks said.

Anderson and Brooks were among the first witnesses called by Sandusky's attorneys following a prosecution case that lasted into the fifth day of the trial.

The attorneys argued prosecutors were overly broad in establishing a timeframe for the charges, making them impossible to defend against. In some cases, they said, prosecutors failed to establish the age of accusers and the location of alleged crimes, and did not present enough evidence to substantiate charges of indecent deviate sexual assault where the views of eyewitnesses may have been obscured.

Separately, prosecutors withdrew a single count of unlawful contact with a minor, a third-degree felony punishable by up to seven years in prison, after discovering the related law did not go into effect until a year later.

Cleland ended court just before 2 p.m. Monday to accommodate the technical requirements of an upcoming defense presentation and witness scheduling. Before dismissing jurors for the day, Cleland said they would be sequestered for deliberations, which he expected would begin Thursday afternoon.

Sandusky declined comment when asked if he would testify, as his lead attorney, Joseph Amendola, promised in an opening statement last week.

Before the early adjournment Monday, Sandusky's attorneys called half a dozen character witnesses, including the former coaches, Anderson and Brooks, two former Second Mile counselors and a prominent local political consultant who once worked for Sandusky.

The defense attorneys appeared focused on two goals with their presentation: minimize the unseemliness of Sandusky showering with children; and paint him as an upstanding citizen with a reputation as a "local hero" until his arrest last November.

After court adjourned, Sandusky's attorneys subpoenaed attorney Tom Kline for copies of his fee agreement with Victim 5 and "any and all" communications with the media and the attorney general's office, which is prosecuting the case.

Kline, a Hazleton native, said he saw the subpoena as a byproduct of a defense attempt to smear accusers who have hired attorneys. Kline described Anderson and Brooks' testimony as a "cultural affirmation of showering with children," particularly in athletic circles.

Anderson and Brooks' version of showering alongside children - for hygienic, not sexual purposes - clashed significantly with the allegations of Sandusky lathering soap on young boys' backs, shampooing their hair and lifting them up to a spigot to rinse.

Victim 5 testified last week that Sandusky assaulted him in a Penn State shower after a workout at the football facility in August 2001. Sandusky removed his towel in a sauna and exposed his penis, Victim 5 said. Later, in the shower, Sandusky forced him to touch it, Victim 5 said.

Wesley M. Oliver, a Widener Law School professor and NBC News consultant, said Anderson and Brooks' shower testimony and the idea of a "culture of showering" appeared to be "blown out of proportion."

"There is a culture of showering at the YMCA. You go in. You do it. There are kids there. There are not kids there. You don't pay attention one way or the other. That wasn't a big deal," Oliver said.

Brooks' testimony amount bringing his granddaughter into the men's shower room at the YMCA sounded like a "mistake in testimony," Oliver said.

"I honestly wonder if he meant what he said because I don't know where he would have taken her in the Y to have done this," he said. "That was bizarre."

Four other witnesses focused on areas other than the shower room, including former Second Mile fundraising director David Brent Pasquinelli and former intern Brad Witmer, who now teaches the second grade in Bellefonte.

Pasquinelli, the former campaign manager for U.S. Rep. Glenn Thompson, said he and Sandusky made at least 15 car trips together across the state, visiting prospects for a $7 million fundraising campaign between 2007 and 2009.

"I saw a mutual admiration between Second Mile youth - boys and girls - with Jerry," Pasquinelli said. "I saw a lot of goofing around. Jerry had a very unique way how he could relate to youth of all levels and really get to their level and communicate."

Witmer recounted a lesson he said Sandusky taught him after the accuser known as Victim 4 failed to show up for an appointment with the former coach.

"I can remember sitting down on the steps and apologizing to Mr. Sandusky for not seeing (Victim 4) that day," Witmer said.

"(Sandusky) was fairly positive about it and just said, 'You've got to understand when you're dealing with kids coming from a difficult situation, they're not always going to show up for you, but you always have to be there for them,'" Witmer continued." I've always carried that with me."

msisak@citizensvoice.com

570-821-2061, @cvmikesisak

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